The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1887-07-27

is oats, peas and sweet potatoes, but
there are many valuable adjuncts and
additional foods of which the South Car.
olina farmer can take his choice, and the
effort should be to make the hog do his
own gathering, so as to save labor. To
do this we must have fencing, and a good
deal of it, or use hurdles. I have about
thirty acres in ten patches, ranging in
size from one to ten acres, and being
fortunately situated, have running water
in all of them but two. This is where I
grow most of my hog food. Let us start
in January and go through the year.
The first crop to plant after Christmas
is maugold wurtzel, or stock beets. On
very rich land, well prepared, they yield
enormously, and hogs eat them greedily
tops and all. Sow in February on fat
beds two and half feet apart; thin to
one every twenty inches, and plough and
hoe like any other crop. They can be
laid by before cotton needs much atten-
tion. They are ready to feed in June
and can be used as needed till Christmas.
I always feed mine in July and August,
as they are not needed later, except to
give variety, and here let me say the hog,
Notwithstanding his hoggish nature, will
appreciate variety of food, and needs
change of diet as much as any other ami
NAL. I bed out twenty-five bushels of
sweet potatoes in March from which to
obtain draws, and I plant about ten
acres in this crop every year. It is
strange that our people overlook its
value 30.
The last of April 1 plant sorghum and
apeckled speass inA drills so%assto work
them; and; asYfast as the barley patches
come off, 1 SOW or plant them in peas or
potatoes. I try TO have succession OF
pea patches to turn the hogs in, COM
.menciDg the last Of. July and continuing
lstiipthe corn sfeldssare opened in the fall.
Peas and potatoes supplement each other
admirably and furnish complete
Eration.'I Thstiis, the albuminoids And
carbohydrates are properly proportioned
for healthy and vigorous growth. fThe
peas furnish the first and the potatoes
the latter. Either by itself is not 30
good, and peas in excess or by them.
selves are likely to produce disease.
1 lost many fine, fat hogs from cholera,
so.called, before I fed the peas and pota.
toes together. sameness of diet and lack
of salt were the causes which produced
the disease. Here let me mention that I
make i'd rule Iosfsedsng hogs op salt
anda ashes every week:and have hsVno
disease among thom since I commenced
it. Half bushel OF wheat bran or meal
and two quarts each of salt and strong
unleached ashes made into slop. They
will be forced then to take the ssfnedi.-
Fcine," but generally theY;are very anx.
ious for it. In May, June and July I
plant peas and potatoes, in August tur.
nips rnd in September l SOW field under
fence in oats, into which the hogs are
turned when in the dough to do their
own "cradling." AS fast as the pea
patches are eaten out they are prepared
for rye and barley to Craze in during the
Winter and Spring.
Here is the bill of fare from January
to December: January, February
March and April-Barley and rye with
few oats and potatoes. May is a bad
month and there is nothing except Ber.
muda grass and lespedelza till oats get
ready. When they are turned in, as I
said, to do their own gathering stick 8,
pin right here, you farmers, who have
poor land and no money, but can build
fence-oats fed off by hogs are the very
cheapest food we can raise. Theyfcost
nothing but the seed and ploughing, Say
s1.5O per acre, and land thus sown and
the crop consumed on it improves and
gathers vegetable matter very fast, and
after few years will make q good crop
of corn or cotton if manured: with COM
mercial fertilizers. Even ifiti too poor
to grow oats high enough to oeutI have
never seen them too low to- eat, but it
will pay handsomely to manure them for
hogs, and peas sown broadcast after the
oats come off will do this very cheaply,
say at cost of another s150 per acre.
But this system requires fencing, and the
stock law, which should have been
blessing, has encouraged the culture of
cotton, and so we grow poorer day by
day, while all we make is spent to buy
food we can and ought to raise. BY the
time the hogs eat off the oats, the speckle
peas are ready about the middle Of July.
Beets are fed with them through July
and August. In September sorghum
comes in, and is most valuable hog
food, alone or fed with peas. Some
green corn, stalk and all, is given as an
appetizer. Squashes, collard leaves,
surplus cabbage and other garden refuse,
all go to the hogs, with any spare milk
and kitchen slops. In October and
November peas and sweet potatoes carry
the hogs bravely along, and with final
Ground off, of corn for a fortnight or so,
they are ready to kill-the first cold spoil
in December-weighing from $50 to 25O
pounds, according as they are ten to six.
teen months old.
have not mentioned many easily.
raised foods which ne can grow in our
favored soil and climate-chufas, ground
peas, Spanish peanuts, artichokes-all of
which are valuable as meal producers.
Let our people only lay aside the idea
that corn is the only hog food and the
trouble is at an end. Everything l have
mentioned excent SORGHUM and beets ia